What if we banned all advertising? Not regulate it—abolish it. This proposal would transform manipulation machines, and maybe save democracy itself. A thought experiment worth considering.

The idea feels like sci-fi because you’re so used to it, imagining ads gone feels like asking to outlaw gravity. But humanity had been free of current forms of advertising for 99.9% of its existence. Word-of-mouth and community networks worked just fine. First-party websites and online communities would now improve on that.

The traditional argument pro-advertising—that it provides consumers with necessary information—hasn’t been valid for decades.

  • whereisk@lemmy.world
    33·
    11 days ago

    Haha! New is a relative term but really? 300k BCE? Reverting to pre organised society to avoid advertising?

    Maybe we should go to pre human times, oh wait, walk through a forest and all you see is flowers advertising themselves to insects and birds advertising their singing abilities to each other.

    So long as there’s competition for resources and attention plays a role in that distribution something will find a way to attract that attention.

    • Whats_your_reasoning@lemmy.world
      21·
      11 days ago

      I didn’t reach to find that era - it was referenced from the article, even the snippet at the top of this very page:

      But humanity had been free of current forms of advertising for 99.9% of its existence.

      Then you provided examples that occured within the most recent .1% sliver of humanity’s existence. Anything more recent than ~30,000 BCE is within that .1% time frame. Ergo, Ancient Rome doesn’t count.

      flowers advertising themselves to insects and birds advertising their singing abilities to each other.

      This is why it’s important to define terms before beginning debates. The advertising people are referencing here is the modern kind targeted at humans in order to manipulate them. To compare that to the symbiotic relationships between flowers and their pollinators, or to animals seeking a mate, (both scenarios that benefit all parties mutually) is a false equivalence.

      Anyway, I tried to keep things light-hearted in that last post, to show that I’m not looking to attack anyone. I gave you credit for providing a novel viewpoint, in an effort to build conversation. But I’m getting the impression that you’re not arguing in good faith. If you’d like have a real discussion, cool, I’m in. But if you’re looking for an argument, I recommend you look elsewhere.

      • whereisk@lemmy.world
        31·
        10 days ago

        Sorry, it was not my intent to offend, I’m never looking for an argument - just look at my post history.

        I got that you gave credit for what you found novel, and cracked a couple of jokes which were quite amusing, even though I wasn’t sure if you were actually considering them as possibilities or just having fun but even without that part it I would just have answered on the merits of your position without argument.

        I don’t usually share laughs with people I argue with and I started my reply with a laugh to show that I’m sharing your willingness to argue in good faith. Maybe it came across mean spirited.

        I’m really confused about what part of my reply was confrontational. I get that most of the conversation’s content is usually non verbal so perhaps you read it in a confrontational tone that was not intended - it was more ribbing or amused incredulousness in the spirited discussion intent and not at all “how dare you” or yelling.

        Now on to the merits of the discussion:

        Look, pulling Ancient Rome and churches and flowers and birds as an examples has a common thread, and that is to argue my conclusion in the last comment. That in any environment of competition for resources were attention plays a role in their distribution you’ll find advertising.

        If the examples from recorded human history are to be cast aside as too soon then what about pre human examples from nature.

        That was the crux.

        Now you find the floral and animal examples as irrelevant because you make a claim that they are symbiotic so they benefit both parties - but I don’t find that convincing as there are not just two parties, or only those examples and also that was not the point.

        The point is the competition for resources where attention plays a role in the distribution and how advertising emerges between competitors and the audience that will provide them with the desired resource or the means for it.

        Whether it is to the benefit or the detriment of the receiver or an unsuccessful advertiser that is not very relevant. After all not all human advertising is detrimental, most is symbiotic. Buying this pack of chewing gums vs another or none, or this mouse trap or spending your time listening to one genre of music vs another doesn’t necessarily hurt you and might even benefit you in some way.

        But a more apt comparison if you want the yard stick to be non beneficial advertising are the million ways that advertising in nature has ill intent - leading one of the parties to their demise: from Venus flowers, to angler fish, to camouflage, to fake mating calls, to fake food and hundreds of other examples.

        But humanity had been free of current forms of advertising for 99.9% of its existence

        Current forms yes for sure, as most of our current communication methods are new.

        But advertising in general? That simply cannot be true. Yes the earliest examples we can find are from early human civilisations a fraction of the estimated age of humanity (however you want to define it, but let’s say Homo sapiens) but if you want to argue that…

        The advertising people are referencing here is the modern kind targeted at humans in order to manipulate them.

        …Modern brained humans were not trying to manipulate other humans in non mutually beneficial ways, either with whatever form of communication was available or with other traps when nature does it at its most basic forms and when I see little kids do it to each other from a very young age then the onus of the argument requires to either explain in detail how are humans not a part of a nature where this naturally emerges or what a society without advertising actually looks like.

        It’s a bit late over here so let’s hope my rumbling is somewhat coherent.